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Mon 25 Jul, 2022 03:27 pm
I have a question surrounding the classification of the earls of Orkney in regards to their ethnicity. Would it not be wise to classify them as Norse gaels, for they, like the lords of the isles as well as the kings of Dublin, were of mixed Norse and Gaelic ancestry? There is proof of a substantial enough Gaelic input (Although varying depending on the given Earl) to classify them as such. Helga Moddansdóttir, for example, is assumed to have been herself half Norse and half gael (with her father being assumed to have been Gaelic, her mother presumably
Of Norse background although she may have been mixed herself), which would make her offspring, Harald Haakonsson, Earl of Orkney, at least 25% Gael, although it is proven that he would have been even more as his father’s lineage had itself some Gaelic input (If I recall, his father being 14/64 Gaelic and 50/64 Norse). Most references to the earls of Orkney do not take notice to their substantial Gaelic admixture which would make them rightfully Norse-Gaelic like all other other Norwegian invaders that intermarried with the gaels-
the house of Uí Ímair.